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Greek Civil War
After the liberation of Greece from German military forces a civil war between the two groups that that helped drive Germany out. There were several conflicts that took place over several years in which the communist group tried to wrestle their way to power. In 1949 the communists announced they were done fighting and fled to Albania. -
Occupation and Division of Germany
Following the defeat of Germany the Allied Powers had to figure out what to do with the country. They met with each other and divided Germany up between the US, Britain, France, and the USSR. The city of Berlin itself was also split between the countries even though it was in the middle of Soviet occupied territory. Citizens on the sides controlled by the US, France, and Britain lived comfortably and had many opportunities, the same could not be said for citizens of the USSR territory. -
Enactment of the Marshall Plan
The Marshall Plan was created in order to provide aid to the struggling nations of Europe following World War 2. It provided more than $15 billion dollars in aid. The plan was set to last 4 years and also had the underlying purpose of preventing the spread of communism. -
Berlin Blockade and Airlift
In order to prevent western countries from traveling and providing aid to eastern Germany, The USSR set up a blockade. This did not prove successful however. Over the span of around a year the US airlifted supplies into the struggling soviet areas and eventually the USSR gave up on the blockade. -
Chinese Communist Revolution
Following attempted peace talks between the communist and nationalist leaders, an all out civil war broke out in China between the two parties. By 1949 the communist party declared victory over the nationalists and established the People's Republic of China. The nationalists fled to Taiwan after their defeat -
Korean War
On July 25, 1950, 75,000 North Korean soldiers poured into South Korea over the 38th parallel in a surprise invasion of the country. Eventually the war became a stalemate and American officials began to worry that the war would escalate to a war between Russia or China. The war eventually came to an end in 1953 when an armistice was signed. The Korean war is technically going on till this day. -
Cuban Revolution
Following an attack on a barracks by communist forces led by Fidel Castro, a revolution began within Cuba. Over time support for Cuba's government, led by Fulgencio Batista, began to fade especially as the US government stopped supporting him. In 1959 Batista fled and Castro took control of the government. -
Overthrow of the Guatemalan Government
In order to protect the profits of the United Fruit Company the CIA sponsored a coup that overthrew the leader of Guatemala. After the leader was overthrown, Carlos Armas instituted a violent authoritarian regime. This was only one instance in a long series of US backed authoritarian uprisings. -
Formation of the Eastern Bloc
In order to counteract NATO, the USSR created their alliance via the Warsaw Pact. Many eastern European countries signed the pact and agreed to defend one another. Over time the pact lost a large amount of power due to it's poor organization. -
Vietnam War
After a strongly anti-communist government took over Vietnam, the Viet Cong began to fight against them. This fighting began to escalate and, under the domino theory, the US began to deploy troops to assist the anti-communist government. In 1973 America and the Viet Cong reached an agreement to end hostilities between each other. Vietnam's capital city of Saigon was captured shortly afterwards by the Viet Cong. -
Bay of Pigs Invasion
The Bay of Pigs invasion was an operation conducted by the US government in which 1,500 Cuban exiles attempted to invade Cuba. The attempt failed and most of them were captured and imprisoned. They were eventually returned to the US after the government paid a ransom of $53 million worth of food and medicine. -
Building the Berlin Wall
Between 1949 and 1961 over 2.5 million East Germans fled to West Germany to escape the communist rule they lived in. To stop this, East German soldiers laid down 30 miles of barbed wire in Berlin and forbade anyone from crossing it. By August 15th walls began to be constructed in place of the barbed wire. -
Cuban Missile Crisis
An American U2 spy plane managed to capture images of Soviet nuclear missiles being transported in Cuba, which was only 90 miles from the US. Over the next two weeks tensions between the US and USSR boiled almost to the point of nuclear war. Eventually Nikita Khrushchev agreed to remove Soviet missiles from Cuba -
Prague Spring
Once Alexander Dubcek took control as Czechoslovakia's leader he introduced many far reaching reforms in order to establish "communism with a face". Unfortunately these reforms did not last long as the Soviet Union invaded Czechoslovakia with 600,000 Warsaw pact troops. Dubcek was thrown out of power and his reforms were repealed. -
Overthrow of the Allende Government
Once again the CIA created a coup in which the armed forced of Chile forced the first Marxist leader of Chile out of power. He later killed himself while his fortress was besieged by the Chilean military. Augusto Pinochet then took over and established an authoritarian government. -
Solidarity
The solidarity movement emerged in Poland and was the first independent labor union in the Soviet bloc. After being suppressed in 1981 they reemerged in 1989 as the first group to participate in free elections in the Soviet Union since the 1940's. Afterwards they came to dominate the Polish government. -
Tiananmen Square Massacre
In 1989 almost a million Chinese citizens began to protest the oppressive government. This continued for around a month until the Chinese government had had enough. On June 4th, a military convoy stormed into Tiananmen Square and began firing indiscriminately at the protesters and ended up killing hundreds of them. But as far as the Chinese government is concerned, this never happened. -
Fall of the Berlin Wall
As the cold war began to come to an end, the Communist party in East Berlin announced that on the night of November 9, all checkpoints would be opened between the 2 sections of Berlin. When the checkpoints opened, people flooded into West Germany and began to party. Later that weekend the wall was torn down by over 2 million Germans. -
Fall of the Soviet Union
Over time Soviet leader Gorbachev gradually created a more democratic system of government within the USSR. Eventually Gorbachev resigned and the remains of the Soviet government decided to dissolve their parliament. This effectively led to the end of the Soviet Union. -
9/11 Attacks
On the morning of September 11th, 2001, 4 hijacked planes piloted by 19 Al Qaeda terrorists, hit major US landmarks in a coordinated attack. Both the north and south world trade center towers were hit and collapsed shortly after. The pentagon was also hit by one of the planes but thankfully only damaged one side of the building. The last plane was taken back by the passengers but crashed into a field in PA, killing everyone on board.
